FAITH,JUSTICE, & CLASSROOM
Who Can Afford to be Catholic?
FAITH, JUSTICE & THE CLASSROOM
Who Can Afford to Be Catholic?
When tuition at our own schools rivals the cost of college, we must ask: have we lost the soul of Catholic education?
Catholic Social Commentary ~ A See–Judge–Act Reflection
SEE
What is actually happening in Catholic schools today? Look honestly at the data, the tuition, and the enrollment.
JUDGE
What does our faith demand of us? Measure reality against the Gospel and the example of our founders.
ACT
What must change? Concrete steps that individuals, parishes, and institutions must take right now.
Now SEE and OBSERVE
There is a question that many Catholics quietly carry but rarely voice aloud: Do our schools still belong to all of us? Walk into a Catholic high school in most American cities today, and you will find excellent teachers, vibrant faith communities, fine athletic programs — and a tuition bill that runs anywhere from $12,000 to $25,000 per year, per child. In some markets, it climbs higher still.
This is not a rumor or a perception problem. It is the lived reality of millions of Catholic families who have done the math and concluded, however painfully, that a Catholic education is simply out of reach. The price of a single year at many Catholic high schools now rivals that of a year at a state university. For families with two or three school-age children, the arithmetic becomes impossible.
$15K–$25K
Average annual tuition at Catholic high schools in major U.S. metropolitan areas is approaching the cost of many state universities.
25%
Decline in Catholic school enrollment over the past two decades, as affordability and school closures have accelerated.
The families who are priced out are often not wealthy. They are nurses, teachers, tradespeople — the very working and middle-class families that Catholic schools were built to serve. They believe in the faith. They want that formation for their children. The price tag tells them no.
JUDGE and DISCERN
What Would St. Ignatius Say?
To answer the question of what should be, we need only look to who built these institutions and why. When St. Ignatius of Loyola established the first Jesuit schools and colleges in the sixteenth century, he laid down a founding principle so radical it bears repeating plainly: no tuition fees. None. His insistence was deliberate and theological — education was a work of God, and therefore the poor must be able to sit beside the rich in the same classroom without shame, without barrier, without the indignity of being told they could not afford to learn.
The poor must be able to participate with the rich. That was not a footnote in Ignatian spirituality — it was the founding premise.
THE SPIRIT OF JESUIT EDUCATION, 16TH CENTURY
This was not naïve charity. It was a vision of education as a universal good — a common inheritance, not a commodity. The Society of Jesus funded their schools through endowments, benefactors, and the labor of the Jesuits themselves, precisely so that the schoolhouse door would never become a financial checkpoint.
Now consider the distance between that founding vision and where we stand today. The question is not whether individual Catholic schools are doing good work — many are. The question is: what does the price structure of our entire system reveal about our actual commitments? And the honest answer is troubling. We have allowed the economics of prestige and operating costs to quietly override the charism of accessibility. We have turned institutions built for the common good into institutions that, in practice, serve the privileged.
A Sign of Hope from Notre Dame and even public universities. Will Catholic Grade Schools and High Schools follow the example?
A PROPHETIC EXAMPLE
The University of Notre Dame’s “Pathways” Initiative
The University of Notre Dame has announced that, beginning in the 2026–27 academic year, it will extend free tuition to families earning less than $150,000 annually. This initiative represents a significant shift—Notre Dame is making a deliberate institutional choice to remove financial barriers for lower- and middle-income families, directly addressing accessibility concerns in Catholic education.
Families earning under $150,000/year — zero tuition
The following year: Families earning under $200,000/year — full tuition covered
Families earning under $60,000/year — tuition, fees, housing, and food covered through need-based aid
Notre Dame’s “Pathways to Notre Dame” program is named with intention. The pathway was always supposed to exist. The university is rebuilding it.
Notre Dame’s decision goes beyond generosity. It is a major Catholic institution realigning its financial approach to match its mission of accessibility. By doing so, Notre Dame proves that Catholic institutions with sufficient resources can prioritize access over financial barriers when they choose to. This example invites all other Catholic schools and universities to consider whether they have the resolve to take similar action.
Just last month, Texas A&M — the largest public university in the country — made a similar announcement, expanding its free tuition for students whose families make less than $100,000. Yale University did the same in January.
The University of Chicago waives tuition for students who are the first in their families to attend college or who come from families earning under $125,000. Students from families earning less than $60,000 a year will have tuition, fees, and standard room and meals covered.
MIT, Columbia University, Stanford University, and Duke University are just some other schools with similar policies.
The See–Judge framework demands that we sit with the discomfort of the gap between what Ignatius envisioned and what we have built. That discomfort is not a counsel of despair. It is an invitation to conversion.
ACT
What Must Change, and we must start at the grade school and high school levels. This means a new vision of education for Catholic dioceses: Innovate-Educate-Collaborate.
Naming the problem is not enough. The See–Judge–Act methodology — itself a gift of Catholic social thought, developed in the tradition of the Young Christian Workers movement — demands that reflection move toward concrete action. So what does action look like?
Vouchers are not the end solution. Partisan politics is woven into the voucher program in many states and school districts. History has taught us where these patterns eventually lead.
For Catholic school leadership, it means making access a non-negotiable strategic priority, not a line item that gets trimmed when budgets are tight. It means pursuing endowments aggressively, as Notre Dame has done, so that student support is structurally guaranteed and not dependent on year-to-year fundraising. It means asking honestly: if Ignatius walked through our doors today, would he recognize what we have built?
Dioceses and bishops: Act now to build collaborative funding across schools, so stronger schools support those in lower-income parishes. Immediately halt school closures in underserved neighborhoods. Establish oversight teams this year to reverse consolidation trends and bring resources to where they are most needed.
Catholic parents and alumni: Recognize that your education was made possible by others’ sacrifices. Step forward—form alumni giving circles or commit to recurring donations. Start with your next financial planning session; help ensure today’s students have the same opportunities you did.
For all Catholics, it means refusing to treat tuition prices as simply the inevitable result of market forces — as if the mission of Catholic education were indistinguishable from that of an elite prep school.
The mission is different. The price structure must eventually reflect that difference.
“I have come to think that care of the soul requires a high degree of resistance to the culture around us, simply because that culture is dedicated to values that have no concern for the soul.” ~ Thomas Merton, Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander
Be A Mensch. Act for the Greater Good. Think Eudaimonia
“Naming the problem is not enough. The See–Judge–Act methodology — itself a gift of Catholic social thought, developed in the tradition of the Young Christian Workers movement — demands that reflection move toward concrete action. So what does action look like?”
Here is my suggestion:
Avoid scandal and help the poor
“A preferential option for the poor” should be maintained in our Catholic Schools. If we find that we cannot afford to keep our schools open to the poor, the Church should be ready to use its resources for something else which can be kept open to the poor. We cannot allow our Church to become a church primarily for the upper classes while leaving the poor in the public schools. The priority should be given to the poor even if we have to let the upper classes fend for themselves.
Practically speaking, the Catholic Schools must give up general education in those countries where the State is providing it. The resources of the Church could then be focused on “Confraternity of Christian Doctrine” and other programs which can be kept open to the poor. These resources could then be used to help society become more human in solidarity with the poor. Remember, the Church managed without Catholic Schools for centuries. It can get along without them today. The essential factor is to avoid scandal and cultivate enough Faith to act in the Gospel Tradition, namely, THE POOR GET PRIORITY. The rich and middle-class are welcome too. But the poor must be included.